


Trust Excercises

by thesecondseal



Series: Acts of Reclamation [9]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Developing Relationship, F/M, Fluff, Kissing, POV Multiple, Romance, Trust, Trust Kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-08
Updated: 2015-07-08
Packaged: 2018-04-08 06:03:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4293507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesecondseal/pseuds/thesecondseal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This pair of fluffy, sappy ficlets falls between Convalescence and Nightmares.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Cullen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cullen's pov. 3rd person.

Cullen hadn’t had a nightmare in six days, at least not one that he remembered. He still didn’t sleep well for long. He had relied on lyrium for too many years to blunt the jagged edges of his demons, and he had been paying that dependency ever since he stopped.  As if he had somehow accrued more rest than was his due and now had to pay it back. With interest.  He didn’t think he would ever sleep a full night but he was finally able to lay his head down for a handful of peaceful hours that were not interrupted by memories or demons. He could not remember another such time.

Not since Kinloch Hold.

But as they all settled into Skyhold, he found himself resting. He had finally slept enough to realize how exhausted he was. It was a wonder, he thought, after so many months of sleep deprevation that his mind had managed to do anything useful. It was a miracle that he had been able to contribute at all to what the Inquisition’s forces had become. He doubted less and less the Maker’s will for his life. That so much could be built with so many who were broken…

It was a strange humility. The kind that told him just how small he was, even as it filled him with purpose and hope.

Cullen lay in bed staring up at the stars through the holes in his roof. Dawn was still only a promise, and the deep navy above him glittered with infinite wishes. He would miss the view, he thought, laughing at himself. He was a practical man, by all logic he should have put in a requisition for the repairs months ago, and preferably before their Inquisitor realized he was running her military from a tower without a proper roof.  But as he stared up at the sky, he was thankful that it had yet to occur to Essa to worry. She occasionally forgot that she wasn’t like most humans, that not everyone could sleep exposed to the elements without consequence, but she wouldn’t forget for long. She was careful with the lives of those she guarded and she had taken the role of Inquisitor with a reverent care for those who had put their trust in her.

In truth, the loft was not as cold as it should have been, as high up as they were in the Frostbacks. There was magic in Skyhold’s stones; it drew heat from deep beneath the mountains, and while it was not enough to maintain any true warmth in the keep, rarely did Skyhold freeze.  Not that any of that would matter with rain or snow coming down on top of him. Cullen smiled and climbed out of bed. He would have to see about the repairs soon. The sky wouldn’t always be so clear.

“Good morning.”

Essa’s cheerful greeting drifted up to him the moment his feet touched the floor. Cullen froze where he was, casting a frantic glance around for his tunic.

“Uh—“ He cleared his throat, mouth dry and thick with the dust of sleep. “Good morning.”

Water, he needed water. What had she done? Stayed down there all night?

He found a cup by the bed still half full from when he had gone to sleep, and took a hasty gulp. He took another to rinse his mouth.

“Did you ever sleep?” he called down.

They had stayed up late, sharing his office while going over their respective reports. She had been humming softly, some bawdy sea chanty that he could only guess the Chargers had taught her; she liked to hum, and this tune was new. He had nodded off at his desk—still couldn’t believe it—but she had woken him gently and sent him stumbling up the ladder with a promise to keep watch for a while.

And Cullen had slept without dreaming.

“I told you I would keep watch,” she called back, voice getting louder as she drew closer to the bottom of the ladder. “Did you sleep well?”

“I did,” he admitted, trying not to feel guilty for costing her her own rest.

He failed.

“Maker, Essa, you must be exhausted,” he admonished. “You should have slept.”

She laughed. “There are still hours yet before we leave, I will get a nap.”

She bumped the ladder; the wood creaked a bit in query. “May I come up?”

Ever since that one wretched incident in Haven when their sparring had turned to something angry and dangerous, she had been unfailingly mindful of boundaries he hadn’t even realized he had. Cullen was just beginning to feel comfortable enough around her that he wished she would stop.

“Of course.”

Of course? He glanced around his sleeping space frantically. Had those words really just left his lips? He couldn’t believe how casual he had sounded, as if he were completely at ease and not counting every sound of her hands and feet as she made her way up.

Cullen straightened the covers on his bed. Looked down at his clothes. He had slept in his breeches, the leather worn to such comfort that he knew he needed a new pair. He fidgeted with the laces on his linen tunic. He was covered. Decent.

His bare feet had never felt so naked. Why hadn’t he just told her to wait and then climbed down?

Cullen stood awkwardly in the center of the loft and tried not to stare impatiently at the top of the ladder. When the crown of her head rose above the floor’s edge, he realized he was holding his breath and let it out in a rush.

When her head was fully above the edge of the loft’s floor, Essa paused in her ascent. Cullen watched her eyes roam greedily over the space and he wondered what she saw in the sparse furnishing. Then she looked up at him, eyes lighting like a dark horizon. She smiled and she didn’t notice how his heart stumbled before her.

“Good morning, again,” she said, reaching for the rail to pull herself up the final rungs.

Cullen crossed the short distance between them in a rush. He held one hand down to her, felt his heart kick back to life as she let go of the rail and placed her hand in his. He pulled gently, but she clung to the ladder, holding her weight with the other and on her feet.

He held out his other hand, a teasing challenge in his eyes.

“Don’t you dare drop me,” she warned without threat.

But Essa knew about trust. She understood that it could only be earned if one was willing to stand exposed and defenseless.  She slipped her hand in his, smile determined, body deliberately relaxed.

“I won’t drop you,” he promised.

Essa shivered when the cool, rough pads of his fingers slid across to her palms. Her smile faltered, expression shadowing to keep her secrets as he gently gripped her wrists. Cullen watched the challenge shift between them, wondered what exactly made her eyes go dark.  Her fingers curled around his wrists.

“Let go,” he ordered gently.

Her eyes slipped closed as he lifted her. Cullen felt her feet dragging lightly on the rungs and then her full weight hung between the clasps of their hands. He raised her slowly, watched her cheeks flush and her breath stutter. She didn’t scramble with her feet as she rose, didn’t seek purchase in order to take back the control she had relinquished.  He had the fleeting thought that this was how she earned the love of her four-legged friends.

Cullen wondered if she could gentle the wounded creature he feared he would always be.

He took a short step back as he pulled her the rest of the way up. Essa frowned as she pitched forward with the jolt of momentum. She landed against his chest, heart thudding.

“Brute,” she muttered through her smile.

His hands slid to her elbows, held her steady as she got her feet back under her. Essa tipped her head back to meet the laughter in his gaze.

“Can you blame me?” he asked.

She somehow stepped closer, pressed their bodies together from thigh to shoulder. The sigh that slipped from her was one of bliss.

“No, I can’t,” she said, pulling her arms from his grip to wind them around his neck. “I—“

Her words broke on an impressive yawn and Cullen chuckled.

“You should really sleep,” he said, dropping a kiss on her forehead.

“You should really kiss me,” she retorted. “Or at the least stop dodging my pitiful advances.”

She stretched up on her toes, lips brushing the underside of his chin.

“If I kissed you right now,” he argued. “I would kill you.”

Essa rolled her eyes, stretched another inch out of her feet until she was all but balancing on the tips of her toes.

“I am a lot harder to kill than that,” she whispered.

She kissed him without demand, lips moving like questions over his. Essa didn’t coax or urge, but he found himself wanting to give her everything she never asked for. Their romance was still so new, and they were both hesitant to do anything that might jeopardize the friendship that had grown first between them. Except for the too brief moments when she kissed him outside of the war room, he hadn't touched her that night in the garden. Cullen had lost count of the number of times he had wanted to. There was a long list of practical reasons for neither of them to have done so, but he suspected it was simply that they never knew how to transition from their easy companionship to the passion that waited like an ambush whenever they touched.

“You’re still here,” he murmured.

He had meant the words to be teasing, but there was a truth in them that he hadn’t expected. Cullen could only hope she had taken them as he intended. She laughed softly.

“I told you.” She pulled her lips from his to trail kisses along his jaw. “Hard to kill.”

Cullen slid his arms around her, crushing her closer, until the buttons of her tunic pressed sharply down his breastbone. Essa gasped and he swallowed the small sound, nibbling gently at her lips for a moment. Every touch giving answer to what her lips had asked. She was warm, body already flushed. He could feel the heat of her skin through the layers of their clothes. Had he never held her without his armor between them?

Cullen pulled away reluctantly and she let go. Her eyes were too wide, too bright. He knew he could fall into them if they weren’t both careful.

“You should sleep,” he said again, nodding toward the bed. “I’ll keep watch.”


	2. Essa

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Essa's pov. First person.

I stared at Cullen’s bed, at the pale coverlet and the pillow still indented from his head and tried very hard to school my expression to hide my apprehension. I could sleep in a bed. It couldn’t be any more intimate that sleeping naked beneath the stars in that damnable surcoat of his, but I’d done that without the slightest hesitation. No, it was his bed that intimidated me. I was a grown adult, for Andraste’s sake. Leader of the Inquisition. It wasn’t like it was the first bed I’d ever slept in and he wasn’t even asking me to sleep with him. Just to take a nap, while he kept watch, just as I had done for him in the hours before. I took a breath. Nodded in an absent way. Yes, I could sleep in a bed.  

Even Cullen’s bed.

He saw my turmoil. How could he not have? He knew some of why I had the strangest sleep habits in Thedas. Since coming to Skyhold, we had lost count of the number of times he had found me sleeping in the garden or some other equally unusual spot. He never reprimanded me, not like Josie or Cassandra who found my attempts at finding a suitable den unshakably disturbing. It bothered me more that they didn’t think I was safe in our new home. I understood it was the increased closeness of quarters with our Templar allies, especially after the debacle in the fall. I had declined all suggestions that we set up a forward camp farther down the mountain. More than ever I was determined that we were going to live together.

It was slow going. The keep ran more smoothly without my presence. The Templars trusted Cullen and Cassandra. I hated leaving Cassandra behind as often as I did, but I relied on her to be my ambassador to the Templars more and more.  It was both a benefit and a detriment that I wasn’t “a normal mage.” I must have heard those words four dozen times a day when I was back in Skyhold. I spent a majority of the time in my head wanting to demand to know just what was wrong with other mages and having to concede that I was unusual.

But not because I was a mage.

“Essa?”

It never bothered Cullen that he had to call me so often from my thoughts. I smiled, tried to decide which made me less nervous, staring at him all sleep-rumpled and gorgeous or staring at his politely straightened bed. I chose the floor and that was absolutely no good. Our bare feet were just inches apart and the shared intimacy of standing in his bedroom in the quiet hours before morning hit me like nothing else had yet. It might not be the first time we’d stood without the protection of his armor between us, and Maker knew I didn’t possess an ounce of modesty, but things had changed between us since then.

I was still trying to figure out what that meant.

“You don’t have to stay,” Cullen said softly.

There was no hurt in words. My refusal was not a danger waiting along whatever path we had just started down.

“I think I want to,” I admitted.

I had slept near him before, but not alone. Geri had been cropping grass nearby and Cullen had still been no more than one of my advisors. I’d kept my balance by taking his and in some odd twist we’d left that night a cautious sort of friends. 

His fingertips brushed the underside of my chin, turning my face up to him.

“Just let me finish getting dressed and I’ll head down to the office. You’ll have the place to yourself.”

He smiled, tipped my head back farther until I was staring up at the…lack of ceiling.

“See,” he teased gently. “Not closed in.”

I started to protest. How long had he been sleeping without a decent roof over his head? Was he trying to catch his death of cold?

Cullen laughed at the stormy expression on my face and stopped my words with a gentle press of his lips to mine.

“I’ve been enjoying the view,” he said. “But I’ll put in the repair order today, I promise.”

He stepped away and I found my hands following. I wasn’t ready to give up our proximity. We so seldom had time alone.  I had taken to bringing my work to his office on the nights that I was in Skyhold. We shared meals and comfortable silence. That had been our routine before and after he kissed what little sense I had out of my head.

I stood in the center of the loft staring up at the sky. He was right, it was a nice view. I wondered if there was a way to seal it from the elements without closing it in. A mage barrier? Even if it had to be recharged every month or so it would be worth it. I remembered reading somewhere about a magnificent greenhouse in Tevinter. Instead of glass, the room had been a combination of beams, focus stones, and magic…

Would he mind that sort of magic use? I wondered. He wasn’t comfortable with casual magic, but he didn’t seem to mind mine. At least not the healing. The mark was mostly quiet and Cullen no longer grumbled to me about Cole. Still there was a long stretch between benevolent spirit with whom he rarely interacted and permanent magical ceiling in his bedroom.

“You are asleep on your feet, Es.”

I turned back to Cullen. He sat on the edge of his bed to pull on his socks and boots. He was right. I had been staring sightlessly at the sky, afraid that If I stopped moving for even a moment, I would crash. It was the only way I slept most nights. I fell into the Fade only when I was too tired to dream. The familiar sounds lulled me. Leather being snugged and laced into place, poleyns buckled over knees.  I missed my armor; I still dressed more heavily than my fellow mages recommended, but I would grudgingly admit when pressed that I was enjoying the freedom of movement afforded by my leather.

I heard both of his feet touch back to the floor.

“Come here,” he entreated.

I dragged my bleary gaze from the sky and trudged to where Cullen sat on the edge of the bed. I was tired enough to be heedless of the boundaries we were still negotiating. I stepped between his knees, and only the side of the mattress stopped my forward motion, keeping too many inches of space between us. His hands came up to rest on my hips and I flinched, heart immediately pounding hard and fast in my chest.

“Is this alright?”

I nodded, breathless from such a simple touch. It had been so hard to tell him, but I was glad that he knew my demons. He understood that I wanted him too much for either of us to find peace in that desire.

At least right now.

I took a breath, found a smile to give him.  Cullen tipped back his head, throat exposed, lips offering a kiss if I could find the strength to take it. I cupped his face in my hands, fingers scratching lightly through the dark scruff on his jaw.

“I am far too fond of you,” I said teasingly, trying to cover my nerves.

But I kissed him anyway, because I was leaving in a handful of hours, because he was courageous enough to offer himself to me even with everything we both carried.  He sighed softly against my mouth, hands tightening on my hips, but he didn’t pull me closer, didn’t try to take charge of my cautious exploration. I kissed him until my body was clamoring for him. Until my hands crept of their own volition to the hard muscles of his shoulders. Until there was no breath left between us and all I could think about was pressing him back onto his bed.

He was, without question, the most patient man I knew. So I was surprised when he gently but firmly put distance between us. I stepped back; his hands fell from my hips and the quiet of the loft slid softly between us.

“It’s not just you,” Cullen said with rueful smile. “You test both of us.”

I noticed then that he was as flushed as I was. I took a shred of cold comfort that he desired me with his own recklessness. Cullen got to his feet and I retreated farther. He took a second step toward me and I had a moment of uncertainty before I realized I was between him and the armor stand.

“Let me,” I half asked, reaching for his leather jacket.

It was his turn to eye me with trepidation. I felt the tension ease between us and the night. I grinned. He liked trust games, well it was my turn. I held the jacket open and waited, my bare toes tapping a cheerful challenge against the cold floor.

“Alright,” he agreed, amber eyes sparkling.

He lifted his arms, held the long cuffs of his linen tunic with his hands so that the sleeves wouldn’t bunch as I slid the leather over first one arm then the other. I stood before him, head bowed toward his chest trying to ignore the mingling of scents. Leather, linen, and cold starlight. Hints of ink and parchment. His lips always tasted like sunshine, slow and golden. So many of my favorite colors in one man. I took a slow breath and carefully tied the off-center tongs that held the jacket closed.

“You’re concentrating very hard,” he murmured, breath tickling my hair.

I jumped, and smacked his shoulder lightly. “Stop that,” I retorted. “Can’t have the Inquisition’s commander looking like a slattern.”

The soft leather was different from the quilted doublet I once wore, and I was momentarily distracted by the way the supple hide skimmed over linen and muscle. Cullen’s breathing changed, I could feel his gaze on the top of my head and I shivered.

“Are you cold?” he asked, an absolute study of polite consideration. “I have an extra blanket in the trunk.”

I gave him a disgusted grunt that would have stood Cassandra proud. He knew I wasn’t cold. I turned back to the stand, picked up his breastplate and held it between us like a shield. Cullen bent toward me and I slipped the piece of armor over his head, busying myself with familiar straps and buckles, snugging it perfectly into place. The rest followed with a brisk efficiency for which I was proud. Spaulders, gloves, vambraces.  I reached for his old robe turned surcoat, feeling safer with every additional layer between us.

“Essa.”

He tested my name as if he were tasting wine. Those two syllables drifted down, slow and sweet, utterly destroying whatever illusion of detachment his armor had so briefly granted. We were standing too close to each other.  I wondered if he could feel the heat coming off from my skin.

“Cullen?”

My question was an answer. I didn’t look up at him. I held the remnants of his Templar robes, fingers buried in the heavy fur collar he wore without care for the teasing it incurred. He liked the weight. It was a comfort when his body felt stretched and thin, without solid ground beneath his feet.

“Maybe the next time we decide to do this, we should reverse the order.”

It wasn’t the worst line and I chuckled, just as he intended.

“Are you telling me that you don’t feel safer for having been buckled into your armor, Commander?” I demanded laughing.

“Do you?”

I grinned sheepishly. “A little,” I admitted. “At least now there are enough layers between us that I might come to my senses before I stripped you down and had my way with you.”

He groaned, but before I could mumble a half-hearted apology, he grabbed my chin with one gloved hand and kissed me. Hard.

“Get some sleep, woman.”

The words tasted like an order, even with humor teasing through them. I tried not to grin.

“Fine, fine,” I grumbled.

I pushed away from him, stumbled back toward the bed and threw myself upon it with as much theatrics as I could manage given my state of fatigue.

“Don’t let me sleep past eighth bell.”

“I won’t.”

I was asleep before he finished dressing for the day. That was when I first began dreaming of Cullen.





End file.
